Wyoming
Research Resurrects Dinosaur Debate Over ‘Baby T. Rex’ That Roamed Wyoming
The first major dinosaur news of 2024 is a tyrannical act of necromancy. New research has grabbed the paleontological equivalent of “the third rail” by making the case to resurrect Nanotyrannus, a tiny tyrant dubbed “Baby T. rex” buried in enormous controversy.
Tyrannosaurus fossils discovered in the Hell Creek Formation, which stretches across Montana and the Dakotas, have been giving paleontologists hell. A new paper published Jan. 2 is the latest fuel in the raging fire over the dinosaur diversity — or lack thereof — at the end of the Age of Dinosaurs.
“For decades, a debate has gone on as to whether certain mid-sized specimens of tyrannosaur from the Hell Creek Formation of the American West represent juveniles of Tyrannosaurus rex, or if instead, they represent a separate dinosaur called Nanotyrannus lancensis,” said Thomas Holtz, Ph.D., who is the principal lecturer on vertebrate paleontology at the University of Maryland.
The majority consensus is that there is no Nanotyrannus. Since its fossils are found in the same places as the infamous Tyrannosaurus rex, which includes Wyoming and the surrounding region, most paleontologists believe the carnivore that looks like a smaller T. rex is just a smaller T. rex.
Paleontologists Nicholas Longrich and Evan Saitta studied the interior and exterior of dozens of Tyrannosaurus fossils and those previously attributed to Nanotyrannus. Their paper concludes that “the evidence strongly supports recognition of Nanotyrannus as a distinct species.”
Nanotyrannus tends to dominate the dinosaurian discourse whenever it’s brought up, and the newest research is no exception. It’s a prehistoric standoff that’s as heated as any political debate.
Tiny Tyrant, Big Debate
The dinosaur formerly known as Nanotyrannus roamed Wyoming, Montana and the western United States about 66 million years ago at the very end of the Age of Dinosaurs. But the controversial story started in Cleveland, Ohio, in the 1980s.
The relatively complete skull of a carnivorous dinosaur was found in 1942 by the Cleveland Museum of Natural History during an excavation in the Hell Creek Formation of Montana. It was quietly kept in the museum’s basement for over 60 years.
In 1985, paleontologists Bob Bakker, Phil Currie and Michael Williams “rediscovered” the skull and described it as the distinct dinosaur species Nanotyrannus lancensis. They concluded that the legendary Tyrannosaurus was sharing its kingdom with a smaller cousin, a “pygmy tyrant,” as the name reflects.
The roar of Nanotyrannus has been deafening since.
Most paleontologists doubt the validity of Nanotyrannus for several complex reasons. The simplest (and biggest doubt) is where the divisive species resides in the fossil record and paleontology’s understanding of Tyrannosaurus.
So far, all the Nanotyrannus specimens are sub-adults, while a definitive adult has yet to be discovered. Meanwhile, those fossils are the same size and shape paleontologists would expect for a teenage Tyrannosaurus.
Validating Nanotyrannus would tear open a teenage Tyrannosaurus-sized hole many paleontologists believe Nanotyrannus already fills perfectly well.
“Definite Tyrannosaurus rex specimens of the same age-at-time-of-death as the ‘Nanotyrannus’ specimens aren’t currently known,” Holtz said. “Either there are two tyrannosaurs in this community of dinosaurs, one only known from teenagers and another only known from adults, or the smaller ones are the juveniles of the adults.”
Becoming A Tyrant
Holtz is one of the world’s foremost experts on Tyrannosaurus and its relatives. Once the paper burst onto social media, paleontologists and dinosaur enthusiasts worldwide eagerly awaited his take.
“Longrich and Saitta present evidence for the idea that we have two separate dinosaurs,” he told Cowboy State Daily. “This is certainly a possibility. Most of their arguments hinge on the idea that the degree of difference between the two is too much to be explained with growth.”
Holtz commended Longirch and Saitta for aspects of their thorough research. They included all the potential specimens of Nanotyrannus found since 1985, and they present a more complete list of skeletal differences between Nanotyrannus and Tyrannosaurus.
There are “accepted facts,” like the curiously slender jaws and teeth of the Nanotyrannus specimens, that raise questions on how Tyrannosaurus grew up. However, even if the fossil record of Tyrannosaurus is filled with “growing pains,” Holtz believes its close relatives offer valuable insight that explains the drastic changes all tyrannosaurs underwent.
“Animals change with growth, and animals with a lot of growing to do go through a lot of changes,” he said. “Other tyrannosaurids, like Gorgosaurus and Tarbosaurus, show many of the same differences between youngsters and adults, only not to the same extreme because the adults are not as big as adult Tyrannosaurus.”
The Teen That’s Not An Adult (And Vice Versa)
The game-changing discovery will come from a fossil that hasn’t been discovered or published yet. Holtz said that specimen would need to be “a definitive adult Nanotyrannus which is unquestionably not a Tyrannosaurus, or a 12-year-old Tyrannosaurus which is unquestionably not a Nanotyrannus.”
There are potential candidates.
“Jane,” the tyrannosaur skeleton at the Burpee Museum of Natural History in Rockford, Illinois, has been cited as the first complete specimen of Nanotyrannus.
Meanwhile, paleontologists at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences are researching the “Dueling Dinosaurs,” two of the best-preserved dinosaur specimens ever found in the United States. One of the two is a 98% complete tyrannosaur in the same size range as the potential Nanotyrannus specimens.
One or both specimens might settle the controversy, but the research on them has yet to be published. Until then, since science doesn’t settle longstanding debates with “slam-dunk papers,” Holtz doesn’t think the new paper conclusively ends the Nanotyrannus debate.
“Some might find this paper convincing, and that is perfectly reasonable,” he said. “But others may still hold off on this hypothesis for the time being.”
Siamese Or Orange Tabby?
Angela Reddick is a paleontologist who works with Northwest College in Powell and the Washakie Museum in Worland. She has a master’s degree in Geology from Northern Illinois University and a background in mathematics and statistics.
Reddick isn’t a tyrannosaur expert, but her master’s thesis was on a statistical analysis that grouped the femora, upper leg bones, of multiple individual Allosaurus, the large Late Jurassic carnivore, by age of the individual the femur belonged to.
From a statistical perspective, Reddick thinks a compelling case has been presented.
“I think it makes a lot of sense,” she said. “It’s a little hard to say, but I agree with their general conclusions. Nanotyrannus, in my opinion, probably is a separate species.”
However, the lines between different species and different individuals can be tricky. Longrich and Saitta’s study used a variety of skeletal differences, mainly in the skulls of Tyrannosaurus, to show several distinct traits not seen in Tyrannosaurus but present in all the Nanotyrannus specimens.
Reddick described the dilemma of classifying dinosaur species by comparing it to the outlandish variety in today’s furry companions.
“It’s difficult to differentiate species when they’re closely related,” she said. “When looking at the Siamese cat versus an orange tabby cat, they’re not different species. Whereas when you have two dog breeds, like a Great Dane and a Chihuahua, those are ridiculously different but can interbreed and produce viable offspring. You can’t always tell when they’re that closely related.”
Reddick also wishes the paper looked beyond the dinosaurs’ skulls and deeper at the other parts of their skeletons. A head can tell someone a lot, but it’s not the whole story.
“There is a distinct difference in length, girth and shape in some leg bones that I would say still are consistent among one species, let alone might be indicative of (multiple species.)”
Breaking The Lance In Wyoming
Nearly all the hotly debated fossils of Nanotyrannus, including the Cleveland specimen, “Jane” and the Dueling Dinosaurs, have come from Montana, a paradise for anyone hunting Tyrannosaurus and its tyrannical kin.
In Wyoming, several Tyrannosaurus fossils and a handful of complete skeletons have been found, but nearly all have come from adults. Wyoming is seen as a lesser vassal state in the realm of the Tyrant Lizard King and barely factors into the Nanotyrannus debate.
However, a growing amount of fossil evidence is being collected from the Late Cretaceous rocks of Wyoming. The battle raging over the owner of dinosaur bones in Montana may be solved by the teeth and other fossils emerging outside Glenrock.
The Triceratops Gulch Project has collected thousands of fossils from the Lance Formation, which was deposited when Tyrannosaurus ruled Wyoming. For several summers, dozens of paleontologists and citizen scientists have traveled to Glenrock to assist in the excavation.
Matt Mossbrucker, director of the Morrison Museum of Natural History in Morrison, Colorado, has led the project with the Glenrock Paleon Museum. Fossils excavated and examined by Mossbrucker and his field teams in Glenrock have informed his professional opinion on the validity of Nanotyrannus.
“I remain unconvinced that Nanotyrannus is a juvenile Tyrannosaurus,” he said. “As someone who approaches these contestable fossils without the zeal for the mythos behind tyrannosaurs, I think the growing sample of Nanotyrannus fossils indicates it was a distinctive animal. Frankly, if it weren’t found in the same beds that entombed Tyrannosaurus, I do not think we would be having this discussion.”
The Hell Creek Formation in Montana and South Dakota ranks as one of the most studied rock layers in the world. The lesser-known but contemporaneous Lance Formation in Wyoming reveals another view of the prehistoric past, and the answer to the vexing Nanotyrannus question may be in that view.
Wyoming fossils may have played a small part in the ongoing controversy, but Mossbrucker believes they will have a significant role in the future of Nanotyrannus.
“Bones and teeth collected by the crew at Triceratops Gulch, along with the specimens I have examined, have given me insight into this dinosaur,” he said. “Nanotyrannus seems to be a more common large carnivore during the end-Cretaceous than T. rex in our field area in the Lance Formation outside Glenrock. Wyoming’s fossils will no doubt play a key role in understanding Nanotyrannus.”
Mossbrucker and his colleagues are working on their own research based on the fossils collected from Triceratops Gulch. Once published, it will add more knowledge to the paleontological community and fodder for the ongoing debate over Nanotyrannus.
Ultimately, the dinosaurs themselves will answer these long-standing questions once their fossils emerge from millions of years of burial and reveal their secrets. Mossbrucker cited the words of John Bell Hatcher, the legendary paleontologist who found the first fossils of Wyoming’s state dinosaur (and Tyrannosaurus/Nanotyrannus dinner option), Triceratops.
“The fossils contradict expert opinions,” he said. “Understanding dinosaurs is a numbers game. The more fossils collected, with contextual data, the greater our perception of these animals. Each summer field season yields new finds, and summertime is around the corner.”
Andrew Rossi can be reached at arossi@cowboystatedaily.com.
Rich Renner always knew he had pretty good neighbors, but he found out just how good when his new rescue dog from California got himself lost in a Wyoming whiteout.
Renner had taken the goldendoodle named Charlie out ahead of this past week’s storm to relieve himself. There was some snow on the ground at the time, but Charlie wasn’t having a thing to do with that strange, cold, white stuff on the ground.
At least not at first.
“I had taken him out to the barn, but he was staying under the overhang,” Renner said. “He wouldn’t go out to the snow.”
Given the dog’s reluctance, Renner decided to shovel a path from the barn to the house to make it a little easier for the pooch to get around.
While Renner was doing that, the dog finally decided maybe the snow wasn’t so bad after all.
“He kind of got the zoomies,” Renner said. “So, he was running around and went around the corner, out of sight. I had boots on, so I followed after him.”
By the time Renner turned the corner, there was no sign of Charlie.
A California Dog Meets His First Wyoming Whiteout
At first, Renner wasn’t too concerned. It wasn’t the first time the dog had done a little bit of exploring around the house.
Normally, he came back on his own.
But this time was different. There was a huge snowstorm expected later in the day, and the forecast was for temperatures in the range of 25 degrees.
Charlie is a rescue dog fresh from California, which means the goldendoodle didn’t have much in the way of fat stored in his body. Nor was he yet acclimated to the cold.
Renner followed his dog’s tracks down to a forested edge, and there saw what had captured Charlie’s attention.
“There were deer tracks all over,” Renner said. “Boom, he was gone.”
Renner was at first more worried about the deer than the dog.
He’d just put an AirTag on the dog’s newly arrived collar right before they went outside that morning. The collar also had the couple’s names and phone numbers.
“An hour later, that AirTag pinged at a neighbor’s house about a half mile away,” Renner said. “So I zoomed down there on a four-wheeler and I saw tracks, but no Charlie.”
Renner roamed around on his four-wheeler for about an hour, looking for and calling for Charlie. Then he had to go to work.
“My wife, Barb, stayed home all day and worked off and on and looked for him some, too,” he said.
A Long, Cold Night
Once Renner returned home, he and his wife did more searching until about 10:15 p.m. that night using a headlamp to see.
“I thought I’d see his eyes somewhere with that headlamp,” Renner said. “But to no avail.”
By this time, a sick feeling was growing in the pit of his stomach.
He was thinking about how the dog had chased after an animal three times his own size and how sometimes deer had charged, unafraid, at the couple’s older husky.
Maybe Charlie had been hurt. And Wyoming’s famous winter winds were picking up.
Was his California pooch stuck somewhere outside in this Wyoming whiteout, where the temperature was just getting colder and colder?
“It had snowed all day,” Renner said. “It was just a lot of snow.”
That snow covered the dog’s tracks, making him impossible to track.
The AirTag was proving next to useless as well, suggesting the dog had gone somewhere very rugged, some place with little to no data to transmit a signal.
Tuesday night, Renner could barely sleep thinking about Charlie, lost in this heavy snowstorm, with temperatures forecast to get into the lower 20s that night.
“Since we didn’t find him, I’m thinking, ‘Oh my God, he’s not going to survive the night,’” Renner said. “I kept waking up a lot and thinking about him. Like, ‘Oh my gosh, what’s he experiencing right now? Where’s he at? Did a mountain lion get him?’”
The next day, Renner and his wife were both exhausted but had not lost hope they would yet find Charlie.
They were looking, their neighbors were all looking. They even hired a drone company to come look for Charlie using an infrared camera.
Neighbors Rally As Storm Deepens
The Renners had been putting messages out on Facebook and social media about Charlie, asking for the community’s help to find him.
Renner was amazed at how his neighborhood sprang into action.
It seemed that everyone he knew — and even some people he didn’t know yet — were looking for his pet, who he feared was too skinny to survive another night out in the cold, much less the cold, wet snowstorm that continued into Wednesday.
“Before, I lived in Cheyenne for a lot of years, and you didn’t even hardly know your neighbors,” he said. “You maybe said ‘hi,’ to them when there’s a snowstorm and you’re shoveling your snow at the same time.
“But other than that, we didn’t even know our neighbors.”
Mountain Meadows, though, proved to be a different kind of friendly — the kind that doesn’t smile and wave in passing; the kind that shows up on the doorstep and asks, “How can I help?”
“There were probably six different vehicles or side by sides at different times looking for him Tuesday night,” Renner said. “And then people were passing the word on through Facebook and emails and everything.
“And just everyone was praying for him. I mean the number of prayers that went up for Charlie is just amazing.”
A Blind Date, A Snowy Hike, And A Lost Dog
While a small army of neighbors continued to search for Charlie with drones and side-by-sides, a newlywed couple the Renners had never met were on a surprise date.
Jada, a Laramie native, and Collin Szymanski, from Utah, are newlyweds.
Since Collin is new to Wyoming, Jada has been making a point of showing him some of her favorite places.
That day, she’d decided on a literal blind date, complete with blindfold, to one of her favorite places in Curt Gowdy State Park — Hidden Falls.
The falls are a couple miles from where the Renners live as the crow flies, and maybe 10 miles or more away in twisting, winding, dog-chasing-a-deer miles.
By the time Jada and her husband arrived at the Hidden Falls Trail, snow was picking up speed and Jada was starting to question the idea of hiking that afternoon.
“There was, like, snow everywhere,” Jada said. “I was like, ‘Oh man, I thought it was going to be a little less snow than this.’
“So I unblindfolded him and I was like, ‘Should we still go?’”
The couple are young and in love, so of course the answer to that question was, “Yes!”
As they hiked into the thick carpet of new snow, they soon found themselves with a new-but-stand-offish friend.
“All of a sudden we see this little dog running around,” Jada said. “We’re thinking, ‘Oh well, his owners must have decided to go on a hike in the snow, too.’”
The Sound Of Loneliness
When they got to the end of the trail, though, there were no owners around.
That was when Charlie began to howl, a haunting, lost sound.
“You could tell he was so sad,” Jada said. “So we were trying to get to him, but he was a little scared of us.”
Once Jada managed to get close enough to see Charlie’s collar, things changed. The second she said his name, the dog immediately calmed down and came over to them.
It was remarkable, given that Charlie had only had that name for about four weeks. But it clearly meant everything to the dog to hear that one word.
These were friends, Charlie decided, because somehow they knew his name.
An Answer To A Prayer
By noon, with no further sight or sign of Charlie, the Renners’ hopes were dwindling.
Their property backs up to some very rugged country with deep draws and thick timber. It’s a maze of places to get lost.
It’s also a maze full of obstacles and dangers much larger than Charlie — mountain lions, deer, moose. Then there are box canyons easier to get into than out.
Their skinny California dog, chasing a deer in a full Wyoming whiteout, could easily become lost, trapped, or hurt. More and more, it seemed like that’s what had happened.
Just as they were about to give up and call it a day, Renner got a phone call from a man he didn’t know.
“Hey, are you guys missing a dog?” the man asked.
Relief flooded through Renner at those words as the man told him he’d just found a golden-colored dog at Hidden Falls in the box canyon.
Thanks to the collar, which had the Renners’ number on it, he’d been able to immediately call from the canyon.
“I couldn’t believe it,” Renner said, noting that calls from the canyon are usually impossible to make.
It felt like a minor miracle.
Charlie had spent all day and night Tuesday in a snowstorm that got down to about 25 degrees, and had somehow managed to bump into what were the only other hikers on the Hidden Falls Trail, somehow none the worse for his adventures.
Soon, Renner and his wife were headed in their cars to go pick up Charlie from the Szymanskis, meeting halfway between their home and Hidden Falls.
For Rich, who describes himself as a person of faith, all these details add up to something bigger than coincidence.
“I know that God makes things happen,” he said.
Jada felt that as well, considering how things happened.
“Their whole neighborhood had been looking for him,” she said. “He told us he had just been praying so hard. We felt like we got to be the answers to those prayers.”
Celebrity Life On A Leash
Back home, Charlie acts as if nothing miraculous has happened at all.
“He’s happy to be home for sure,” Renner said. “He spent yesterday in the barn, and he’s in the barn today.”
But he’s not going outside any more for a while without a leash, Renner said, as he remains just a little too fascinated with Wyoming wildlife, particularly moose, which are 100 times heavier than he is.
Renner is looking into electric fences to keep Charlie and his moxie corralled so that the pooch’s future adventures won’t be quite so harrowing.
“We’re chuckling now, because he’s like a celebrity,” Renner said.
For all the worry and all the searching, what’s really sticking with the Renners is how his Wyoming neighbors were there when needed, crawling the snowy hills in their trucks and side-by-sides, looking for a California pooch with no idea what a Wyoming whiteout really means.
“That’s the real story,” Renner said. “It’s the community, the neighborhood, how everyone just rallied behind this to help.”
Renée Jean can be reached at renee@cowboystatedaily.com.
CASPER — Discarded rocks thrown outside the geology department at an upstate New York college in the 1920s became gems in the eyes of the boy who picked them up.
They were also stepping stones to a career and life that led to 68 years of leading the growth of Wyoming’s — and America’s — mining industry.
Politics and philanthropy also helped John Wold earn accolades like Wyoming Man of the Year in 1968 and Oil/Gas and Mineral Man of the 20th Century in 1999.
But the longtime Casper resident left that century behind and kept going to work in his downtown office, pursuing new ideas and enterprises nearly until his death on Feb. 19, 2017, at age 100.
Peter Wold, 78, remembers his dad as a man who was “driven” and focused, but who always made time for his wife and children.
As he co-leads the oil and gas business started by his father back in 1950, Peter said his dad’s portrait on the wall reminds him of the principles and “purpose” that guided his life.
“I think that he motivated me, and I would say the same for my brother and my sister,” he said. “We’ve all tried to stay engaged in community activities and philanthropy and be good fathers and a mother.”
He not only contributed to the evolution of Wyoming’s energy industries, his financial generosity endowed a geology chair and two chairs of religion at Union College in Schenectady, New York.
He also endowed the Centennial Chair of Energy at the University of Wyoming and his lead 1994 donation to Casper College became the Wold Physical Science Center.
U.S. Sen. John Barrasso, who characterized Wold as a “legend” when he died in 2017, said even though nearly a decade has passed since then, his legacy is all over the Cowboy State — even if younger generations now don’t recognize his name.
“As a professional geologist, John’s contributions to the mining industry revolutionized the way our nation extracts minerals today,” Barrasso said. “Casper College students continue to benefit from John’s generosity and are reminded of him every time they walk through the Wold Physical Science Center.
“John passed on his love for Wyoming and his energy expertise to his family,” the senator added. “He would be so proud of how his children and grandchildren carry on the family business and his tradition of giving back to the state and people he loved so much.”
Big Into Rock
Peter Wold said his dad’s successes in part came from his education, continuous learning and ability to compartmentalize and head for the goal — something he loved to do on the hockey rink as well.
Born in New Jersey, John Wold grew up on the Union College campus where his father, Peter I. Wold, was a distinguished physics professor. The family lived on campus.
While growing up, a young Wold became fascinated with the excess rocks being tossed out by the college’s geology department and started his own mineral collection.
Following graduation from high school, the Eagle Scout attended Union College and became an exchange student at St. Andrews University in Scotland.
While at Union College, he played on the hockey team, and he graduated with a bachelor of arts in geology and went on to Cornell University to earn a master’s degree in geology as well.
Prior to World War II, Wold worked in Oklahoma and Texas for an oil company, but in 1941 he volunteered to help the U.S. Navy’s Bureau of Ordinance researching magnetic mines.
After the bombing of Pearl Harbor, he was sent to Midway Island as a physicist involved in degaussing or demagnetizing submarines to protect them from magnetic Japanese mines.
Navy Man And Inventor
Although he never officially attended Navy officer training school, Wold was given a commission and went on after his Midway assignment to serve as a gunnery officer and executive officer on destroyer escorts.
Peter Wold said his dad’s wartime ship assignments did not involve any significant battles.
It was while in the Navy that Wold had an idea to improve the masks of divers while watching them work.
He applied for a patent in July 1946 for his improved “underwater goggle.”
“The purpose of this invention is to provide an efficient underwater goggle, simple of manufacture, which is of such form that it will fit with water-tightness the contours of most faces without alteration or tailoring by the wearer,” he wrote on the application.
Wold wrote that the design was meant to be flexible enough that it could be worn “across or below the nose of the diver with equal water-tight integrity.”
The inventor received his patent in Casper on Oct. 3, 1950, and it was something he was always proud of.
Peter Wold said he kept it framed on his office wall during his business career.
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John Wold loved Wyoming and enjoyed fishing, skiing, and outdoor activities. (Courtesy Peter Wold) -
John and Jane Wold on parade during his political career. (Courtesy Peter Wold) -
John Wold served in the U.S. Navy during World War II and worked demagnetizing submarines as well as serving as an officer on destroyer escorts. John Wold and his wife Jane in their later years. (Courtesy Peter Wold)
The Oil Field Calls
After the war, John Wold married his wife, Jane, and worked for Barnsdall Oil on the Gulf Coast.
By 1949, Peter was born, and that winter the Wold family was sent to Casper to establish an office for Barnsdall Oil.
The family drove from Houston to Denver and found the roads north had been blocked by the infamous blizzards of 1949 for the previous two weeks.
Peter Wold said his dad liked to tell the story of how he only had enough money for one night in a Denver hotel.
The next day, his dad said it was like a “miracle” and the road opened, allowing them to reach Casper. The highway shut the next day and stayed closed for two more weeks.
In 1950, Wold launched his own firm, Wold Oil Properties, as a consulting petroleum geologist, and never looked back.
A search of Wold in old newspapers shows his progression of accomplishments in both his business life and Republican politics in Wyoming.
Ahead Of His Time
In 1953, in addition to growing his new business, he was a member of the Natrona County Republican Party Executive Committee.
He ran for and won a state House seat in 1956. In 1960, he became the state Republican chairman, as well as a member of the nation’s Republican National Committee.
In 1964, he was the Republican nominee for Wyoming’s U.S. Senate seat to run against Sen. Gale McGee.
His political office high point culminated in his election as Wyoming’s U.S. House representative in 1968 as Richard Nixon was winning the White House.
He was the first professional geologist ever elected to the U.S. House. While there, he authored and sponsored the National Mining and Minerals Policy Act of 1970.
That legislation was instrumental in laying the groundwork for Wyoming’s and the nation’s mining industry.
It directed the U.S. to develop a stable domestic mining industry that’s economically sound and encourages private investment. It also called for standards to dispose of and reclaim mining waste and land to mitigate environmental impacts.
While he was proud of his time in Congress, the scientist and businessman who liked to get things done was stymied there.
“He recognized that he was one of 435 congressmen and that frustrated him,” Peter Wold said. “He said, ‘I’m going to go for the Senate.’”
In 1970, he took on McGee again and lost, as Republicans took a beating in the Nixon midterm election.
Peter Wold said his dad never ran for office again but stayed interested in politics.
On the business side of his life, John Wold excelled and was able to use his geology, chemistry and economics savvy to see opportunities that others might miss.
He also could see when those opportunities were turning south.
During his lifetime, Wold started companies that got involved in pursuing coal, uranium, trona, and coal gasification. But each of those sectors came at different times of his life and career.
“When he focused on something he focused primarily on that project,” Peter Wold said. “He was active in the coal business, in the uranium business. But he did those separately, compartmentalized.
“You have to be really good at what you are doing.”
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John and Jane Wold at their ranch property. (Courtesy Peter Wold) -
John Wold poses with his extended family. (Courtesy Peter Wold) -
John and Jane Wold left a legacy that continues through the next generations of the their family. (Courtesy Peter Wold)
Business Ventures
A joint venture with Peabody Energy and Consolidation Coal Co. (now CONSOL Energy) put Rocky Mountain coal in the spotlight.
In 1973, he started Wold Nuclear Co. and was a co-discoverer of the Christensen Ranch uranium ore deposit in the Powder River Basin.
He also became the principal in the development of the Highland uranium mine in Converse County, which once was the largest uranium production operation in the U.S.
Peter Wold said his dad used a technique with paper cups and a tiny piece of film on the bottom of each cup that would be buried for a few days on potential uranium lands.
While he did not invent the technique to detect radon gas, he used it on a huge scale.
“They wanted to see what radiation penetrations there were,” Peter Wold said. “They laid thousands of those cups all over Wyoming, New Mexico, and Texas.
“With that information they were able to determine there were uranium ore bodies.”
Wold’s holdings of potential uranium lands in south Texas led to an unforeseen talc mining opportunity, so he created American Talc Co., which became one of the largest talc operations in North America. It was sold to Daltile in 2017.
Wold’s interest in trona mining in the southern Green River Basin led to patents on solutions-based mining processes that he worked to create and develop with a Colorado firm.
But several years of work and roadblocks led him to sell the reserves he bought. The technology he helped develop, however, helped transform the trona industry.
Wold also bought a coal gasification idea during the first decade of this century and became chairman and CEO of GasTech.
The company sought to develop gas from deep layers of coal in the Powder River Basin through pumping oxygen down into the beds and setting them on fire.
He worked with an Australian company that had pioneered a similar concept in Australia.
A demonstration plant never came to development.
Peter Wold said his dad’s efforts to develop coal and coal gasification in Campbell County came from his understanding that the coal, natural gas, and oil in the county held more BTUs of energy than all of Saudi Arabia’s oil.
During his life, John Wold’s expertise was sought by many companies that recruited him for their boards.
Hole In The Wall Ranch
Outside of energy, Wold enjoyed Wyoming’s outdoors and sports.
In 1977, he bought the Hole in the Wall Ranch southwest of Kaycee where the notorious Hole in the Wall Gang left their hoofprints fleeing the law.
Peter Wold said his dad did not buy the land because of the history.
“It was because of the fishing,” he said. “The Hole in the Wall Ranch has the Middle Fork of the Powder River as it comes out of the Bighorn Mountains and it runs through the ranch. And it is really good fishing.
“Dad loved to recreate and he loved fishing and one thing led to another and he said, ‘We ought to buy this place,’ so we did.”
While his dad was not that interested in cattle ranching, Peter Wold is.
Today, the ranch runs 600-800 head of Black Angus cattle.
Wold also was key to the development of the Hogadon Basin Ski Area on Casper Mountain and helped support the building of the Casper Ice Arena, where he coached young hockey players.
As he grew older, macular degeneration, a trait that ran in his family, started to take Wold’s eyesight.
Peter Wold said his dad’s loss of vision frustrated him. Even though he couldn’t see well, he kept driving a car into his mid-90s.
“He didn’t like being dependent on someone to take him to the grocery store or bring him down to the office,” Peter Wold said. “The macular degeneration was very discouraging to him.”
Before he died, John Wold put money toward finding a cure for his blindness that became the Wold Family Macular Degeneration Center at Oregon Health & Science University’s Casey Eye Institute at Oregon Health and Science University.
The institute touts the center as a “central hub” for ongoing research and clinical care efforts as well as a “catalyst for further discovery and innovation by having research, clinical care and clinical trials all in one place.”
Throughout his life, the former college athlete never stopped moving and working to stay fit.
Wold would do leg lifts and stomach crunches before getting out of bed. In his 90s, he was still running down his street even on ice and snow.
He continued to challenge himself mentally and never retired.
Legacy Of Giving
As Peter Wold and his brother Jack continue to work in the oil business started by their father, they and their sister, Priscilla Longfield, also continue the legacy of giving launched by their parents.
Peter Wold said the family foundation donates about $3 million a year.
The foundation’s directors include his brother, sister and himself, but John Wold’s eight grandchildren are now involved in choosing who the benefactors will be as well.
While his dad could be a “taskmaster” who wanted his children to have purpose and goals, Peter Wold said he also instilled a desire for them to make a difference in their time.
Peter Wold agrees he feels a “weight” and responsibility that flow from his dad’s accomplishments, and he thinks about that.
“How can I live up to his expectations? What should I be doing that would have him proud?” Peter Wold said. “He left a wonderful legacy that our whole family is proud of.”
When John Wold died at 100, the Casper Star-Tribune dubbed him Wyoming’s “citizen of a century.”
Dale Killingbeck can be reached at dale@cowboystatedaily.com.
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